Growing Up: #LookingForAlaskaContest

 Sighing is what I have been doing a lot lately.

I have been in this country for only a couple years and I can't understand what I am doing to get them to hate me. Looking into the mirror I see my sad little self. My alabaster skin, long red hair, and green eyes. Each attention getting. They pick on me.

For looking different, talking different, thinking different. They pull my hair. Knock me into the mud and hold my head under as they smear mud into my braid. They stick forks and trash in it and laugh thinking its the most hilarious thing they have ever done. I can't stand anyone but me touching it and I have had that hard limit broken so many times. Either to torture me or to try to fix what the bullies have been doing.

Is this what American schools are like? Do the strange and foreign become the whipping post of ignorance? It feels like it.

I'm 13 years old. My teachers like to call me special needs just because I think faster than everyone. I have an accent that sticks me out like a sore thumb. Things have been getting weird for me. The looks and attention some of the bullies who used to throw my sandwiches against the wall or ground and tell me Americans don't eat borscht for lunch are now different. (Yeah... stupid. If they wanted to make sense they would of thrown my thermos.) It is more creepy than anything. Is it because I am tall? I don't know. It is not that important.

I had a talk today with my dad and stepmom. I was hanging out with my friend Jillian and when we were play fighting over the usual random thing she pinned me down and the closeness made me feel something confusing. I still feel lost over it. I think she tried to kiss me. I can barely understand what attraction is and my dad and stepmom tried to explain as much as possible.

What should I do? My dad told me it isn't healthy to keep these emotions and feelings hidden. That it is OK for a girl to like another girl. Yeah, I'm scared. I already get bullied enough. What would they think if they found out I liked girls. There is already talk of some law making it illegal for people who feel like me to get married.

Both my dad and stepmom told me over and over that I shouldn't hide who I am. It will make everything worse. Right now, I feel nervousness and fear. My dad is rarely wrong about these things. I run a hand through my hair as I reach for the phone on my vanity. It's time to make a decision.

I dial the familiar number and the receiver picks up, "Hey... is Jillian in. No problem, I will wait." 

 #LookingForAlaskaContest